oooh, not yet! I've only had one go. ANOTHER thing that impressed me is how well it streamlines everything compared to say UFO. If you've got action points left it'll use them as overwatch should the chance arrive. Actually I think UFO did that as well. Hmm. Fuck, I've forgotten now. Anyway, it did some stuff really nicely that other games would make a confusing mess of menus or icons, and this just does it.

I'd like better camera control so I can better check out what cover to hide behind like a wuss.

Dynasty Warriors Gundam (or whatever it is, the one where it's Dynasty Warriors but robotic). This is mostly to Taurus since I know he loves these. But anyone who likes them can chime in. Am I missing something? I thought I might like this but it seemed quite shit. An amusing cut-scene dialogue, followed by me wading into a load of indentikit robots, hammering at buttons to achieve various styles of biff and chop. Then a walk to a new bit where the same indentikit robots all pile on and I hammer away at the buttons until they stop. It all felt a bit disconnected from my control and the actual action was pretty uninspiring to look at so I got bored very very quickly. What am I missing!? Is there a skill element to it somewhere?

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Taurus
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Yeah, the skill element is in reading the battlefield, darting around, putting superfast combos together, racking up the KO count, taking on the bosses, protecting things, destroying things, multi-tasking, doing things quickly, doing things well, acquiring new items, levelling up your skills, and so on. And the enjoyment comes from doing those things well, but also the pure and simple pleasure of destroying loads of things.

It's not perfect by any stretch (I don't think the rpg elements of DW: G work in comparison to other DW games, the graphics can be a bit unispiring and the story has some high points but is mostly pretty garbage) but it pretty much has the same strengths and weaknesses of any other DW game and they surely do seem to be pretty polarising. I can emotionally blackmail my wife into playing most games, but she won't touch these with a bargepole. For me, I find them hugely enjoyable in a hypnotic/cathartic sort of way (I bet if you were to look at brain scans of people playing tetris and Dynasty Warriors, they wouldn't be that different) but I also love love love the melodrama ("In the middle of a battle Ramba Ral forgot to fight??!!") and GIANT ROBOTS with LAZER SWORDS.

Hmm. I am going to have to play it again and read up on what I'm actually doing, clearly. I just seemed to be traipsing through a one-way canyon in the demo. And doing the same three moves ad infinitum which was taking some of the joy out of the destruction. I am well up for people shouting silly things and massive robot violence fwiw.

There's no 'flow' to the attacks, I found. It may be about giant robots, but the fighting animation felt all steppy and I just couldn't get any combo momentum up at all like you can with DMC or Sands Of Time.

Iain - Mostly I'd agree but there are some major exceptions - this is a crappy video but the Hyaku Shiki (2:15 onwards) is one of the most satisfying-to-control game characters ever. Of course, it doesn't help that he's one of the last characters that you unlock.

Right! I was just enthusing. I'm also slightly addicted to saying 'Hyaku Shiki'. It's right up there with solipsism and concatenate and obsequious.

Also, the characters level up and when they do the number of moves they can combo goes up. So at first they can only combo 3 moves together and they're all hack hack hack, repeat, and then once they're properly levelled they're like spinning tops. But I am sure we are all bored of talking about the Dynasty Warriors demo. Let's talk about the Bladestorm demo!

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Taurus
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iain, weirdly one of the things I like most about Gundam Musou is the way it is so easy to control, and the way the characters respond and act so fluidly and intuitively.

waddie, what about all the things that do destroy back? Like, yeah, early levels are easy, as they are with a lot of games, but it gets a bit more complicated later on.

Anyway, Gundam Musou was probably my favourite game of 2007, except for Bladestorm and Lego Star Wars. And maybe Armored Core 4. And probably other stuff that I'm forgetting. Dynasty Warriors 6 is pretty excellent too (in my head I gave it a 10).

The good thing about this thread is that it's finally prompted me to play Gundam Musou again, even though I have yet to complete the shit out of Bladestorm. The bad thing is that I don't think I'll ever enjoy another game again, because I simply can't imagine anything of any sort being as good as Gundam Musou, ever.